[Dave42]

Originally Posted by OLD BOY

There has certainly been a lot of speculation on here previously about Sky Atlantic coming, and I admit that I was one of them. This was based really on the presumption that the exclusivity to Sky customers on satellite would only last for about a year and that Sky wouldn't keep forking out so much money for the programmes on Sky Atlantic with such a small audience.

The fact that they have continued to have this expensive loss leader for so long is very surprising, particularly as they will have milked it for all it was worth over the first 12 months.

The current prediction about Sky Atlantic, however, is not just down to speculation. It is based on the positive media reports that Sky and Virgin have been in more constructive talks and both now have an air of realism about this. The two companies are co-operating much more now, as evidenced by the recent multi million fibre deal as an example, and Sky are really keen to get the new Sky Bravo channel onto the cable platform. Add the Liberty Global takeover and the Sky/BT spat to the mix, and the media reports that a deal was expected in the autumn all sounds very plausible to me.

You can all believe what you want, but if you prefer to listen to Sky Customer Services employees and vague 'insider' information which is probably not worth a dot, then knock yourself out! Whilst the media can be a little OTT at times and sometimes make too much of very little, I would rather go on information from media reports than from these other 'sources' which just seem to be leading everyone up the garden path.

exactly it speculation only it not coming sooner people realise that the better